


Gather Near to Us

by nukablastr



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst with a Happy Ending, Beachy puns, Christmas, Christmas Vacation, Developing Relationship, M/M, Post-Episode: s19e13 The Undiscovered Country, Trapped In Elevator, everyone is bad at feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2019-10-23 05:50:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17677625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nukablastr/pseuds/nukablastr
Summary: “Sonny,” Bella repeated slowly, emphasizing each syllable and shooting him a sly smile. “Did you know he was gonna be here?” She motioned for Sonny to hand over Julia, who’d begun to show signs of imminent dozing.“What? No,” Sonny said, taken aback. Like he could plan something like this. “How could I know that?” But Rafael seemed to pick up on the strange chord that had been struck, and glanced warily between the siblings.“You really gotta come back to New York, Mr. Barba,” Bella said, tapping his shoulder affably -- a Carisi family signature -- as she shifted her daughter against her hip. “I’m tired of hearin’ rundowns about how the new you is not so good at his job.”--Vacations are less relaxing when spent wrangling your over-large family in a Miami airport hotel a few days before Christmas, and Sonny is pretty sure he'll need a separate vacation to recover from this one. On a last minute grocery run with his sister's family on the eve of their cruise, Sonny runs into Florida-transplant Rafael Barba, who just happens to be flying back to New York for the holidays. A simple invitation to have a drink and an adventure in elevator maintenance bring unresolved feelings to the surface.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _Here we are as in olden days_  
>  _Happy golden days of yore_  
>  _Faithful friends who are dear to us_  
>  _Gather near to us once more_  
>  -Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (Hugh Martin/Ralph Blaine)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! Merry Christmas! Wait, it's February? Oops.  
> So I actually started this sketching this out in like early December, mid Hallmark Christmas Movie binge, and here we are, almost done in early February.  
> I have only watched like 4 episodes of Season 20 (and mostly read twitter commentary about the others -- though to be fair, I think I started tuning out around In Loco Parentis last season), so my hope was that it kinda loosely fits into canon, but given my limited knowledge these days it probably strays. I also ran with Liv's line that all ADAs retire to Florida. And I still have major grumpy feelings about Undiscovered Country a year later, which was the other impetus for this story.
> 
> I own nothing except some sleeping cats, and I am forever indebted to all the authors keeping this ship flourishing. Comments/feedback mean the absolute world to me <3

It was a strange juxtaposition to Sonny, the ungodly humidity of a Florida evening and the tinny Christmas music piped into this Publix parking lot. The lamp poles were decked out in your standard decorations: tinsel silhouettes of trees and bells, wide wreaths hung in the doorways, and yet, it was nearly 70 degrees and he felt entirely overdressed in his jeans.

Sonny came to the grocery store with his sister and her husband not to pick up last-minute supplies — he was a fastidious packer — but to look after his overstimulated niece, Julia. She was wired off the energy of being outside after dark, of her first airplane ride and all the forbidden treats snuck to her by half of the Carisi clan over the course of the day. By the time the four of them made it through the sliding doors, Julia had begged her way onto Sonny’s shoulders and so he had to duck to clear the entrance.

“I thought we were supposed to be getting this one sleepy,” Sonny said to Bella as Julia knotted her fingers in his hair. “Y’know, have her running laps or something.”

“So run some laps with her,” Bella said as she commandeered a cart from the bank of them parked in the entrance. “We'll get her diapers and stuff and meet you back up front in like ten minutes, ‘kay? And seriously, don’t feed her anything else.”

Before Sonny could protest that he had not been responsible for a single smuggled snack that day, Bella gave her cart a forceful shove, blazing the path that her husband Tommy dutifully followed. He gave Sonny a backward glance, their understanding unspoken: _Bella, am I right?_

Sonny wished he’d had a moment to change before they came down to the grocery store, but he hadn't had a spare moment in at least 12 hours. Aunt Concetta had insisted they wear the matching salmon shirts emblazoned with looping script — “Carisi Cruise 2018" — all day in preparation for a ceremonial family photo upon arrival at the airport (“With all the palm trees out the windows, oh it’ll be so perfect!”). Of course, he’d forgotten that he was wearing it almost immediately, and when he sent a selfie to Amanda at the New Jersey terminal aiming to showcase an “Everything’s Better in Jersey” t-shirt on a mannequin behind him, she’d thanked him for the “fantastic blackmail material.”

Oh well. What was ten more minutes in a grocery store he'd never see again?

A few minutes unsupervised found Sonny deliberating over three different flavors of Oreos, and whether he could finish a package before their ship left port in the morning. He _was_ on vacation, the first in what must have been years (he'd lost count), and when on vacation a person can certainly eat three dozen Peppermint Bark Oreos by themselves. But a notification buzzed through on his smartwatch then, and it seemed Bella had already gotten into a short line with her necessities. The Oreos would, sadly, have to wait.

As he passed by the medicine aisle on his way to meet Bella, something in his periphery struck him as strange.

He glanced around, trying to find the source of the dissonance, the chill that played at the fine hairs of his neck as Bing Crosby crooned about mistletoe over the speakers. Given his line of work, this was never a good feeling to stumble upon in the middle of a nondescript public space. He listened for the obvious: raised voices and the sounds of fighting, the scuffle and squeak of linoleum, but he heard nothing suspect. Sonny took a step backward to assess the aisle he’d passed and found it occupied by a woman tapping fervently on her cellphone, and further down, a man studying the label on some small box.

“No shit,” Sonny said to himself as he squinted. The man in the aisle was Rafael Barba.

“Shit shit shit!” The woman in the aisle began to slap her phone against her palm, echoing his own thoughts out loud, and for a brief moment he wondered if he was hallucinating.

Rafael looked up toward the source of the commotion and made brief eye contact with Sonny beyond the woman. Then he looked again, but hey, so did Sonny. He had to look twice to confirm that this was Manhattan SVU’s long lost ADA and not some other bronzed and bearded Floridian in a pale pink polo and chinos amidst the flu remedies and shoe inserts.

Sonny was a different kind of sight, struck frozen where he stood and attempting to make sense of the scene as Julia manhandled the fine hair at his temples. He became acutely aware of the fact that he was still wearing the damn family cruise shirt. Perfect.

“Hey, I’m real sorry to bother you but do you have a charger?” He hadn’t noticed the woman in the aisle, how she’d approached him with her darkened phone outstretched, and her voice startled him from his thoughts. “Um, it’s an iPhone. I just gotta get an address off of it.”

“Sorry— ah—I don’t have one on me.” He shook his head. “Sorry. They might sell ‘em up front?”

She passed him, muttering, leaving just Sonny and Rafael in the aisle, a few paces apart. Sonny thought he might die from the indecision — to approach or flee?

Sonny hadn’t seen him since… the trial? Since before that, really. Rafael had surprised them all, entangling himself so deeply in a case that he wound up on the wrong side of the law. No one saw it coming, least of all Sonny, who in earlier days would have called Rafael _a paragon of virtue_.

It had hurt like hell to learn how little an impact he must have made on Rafael's life to warrant the total disappearing act; no forwarding address, not even a goodbye. One grey afternoon a few days after the trial ended, Liv had briefed them on his resignation, and that was the last they ever really spoke of him at the precinct.

The only explanation Sonny could come up with in the aftermath — and he'd spent a lot of time trying to put that puzzle together in a way that made sense — was some sort of a mental break. But to look at Rafael now, some might say he appeared to be thriving.

“The staring,” Rafael called out finally. “It’s unnerving.”

Sonny took a tentative step into the aisle, then a few more strides in bold approach. “Sorry, I just, ah, wow. It’s really you, huh?”

Rafael set the box he’d been considering into the basket at his feet, then squared his shoulders as though he were bracing for impact.

“Well hey, good to see ya, couns— Rafael.” Sonny extended a hand that immediately felt both too formal and too casual an expression. Rafael shook it nonetheless.

“Yeah, just Rafael these days...detective?”

He nodded. “Detective.”

Rafael hummed thoughtfully and rubbed at his bearded jaw. “Somehow I always thought you’d wind up with my job.”

Julia adjusted herself on his shoulders and Sonny’s hands instinctively shot from her ankles to her knees to steady her. “Nah. I kinda… it lost the… I dunno. Wow. So what are you doing down here?”

He nudged the basket on the floor with his foot. “Eye drops.”

“Well, I meant more like…”

“My life,” Rafael finished the sentence abruptly, as though it were a question he'd grown weary of answering. “Sure. To make a long and dramatic story short: retirement.”

“Ha. I never pegged you as the type to retire to Florida.”

Rafael smoothed the front of his shirt. “And to think they pay you for that intuition.”

Sonny cracked a smile. Rafael had changed somewhat in the months since Sonny last saw him, looked softer in something besides the crisp suits he always peacocked around the courtroom. His new beard was peppered with silver, his eyes less tired, but his tongue was still swift as it was in memory.

Rafael continued: “The weather’s nice, and I have some family here. It made sense. Seems like the family life suits you too.”

“Huh?”

Rafael nodded upward, and Sonny was reminded of the source of weight on his shoulders.

“Oh! Julia.”

Rafael seemed to struggle with what to say next, glancing between the two of them. “She’s—ah—”

“My niece.” Sonny bounced his shoulders, much to her delight.

“Oh. Right.”

“You remember my sister Bella? And Tommy, her, well he’s her husband now. Julia’s theirs. You prosecuted Tommy’s parole officer — Bella was pregnant with her then.” Rafael nodded in recognition. “They still talk about that, you know. What you did for them. You really saved ‘em. Saved Tommy.”

Rafael cleared his throat. “How’s Liv? How’s the precinct?”

“Liv, she works too much, always worried about Noah. I thought— nevermind.”

“Hm?”

“Nothing, s’just I assumed you and her still talked is all.”

“Not really.” Rafael twitched a shoulder. “I… took the approach that I’ve begun a new chapter of sorts, and—”

“You cut all ties.” The flicker of sharp edge on Sonny’s statement was not lost on Rafael, whose expression shifted towards contrition. Sonny amended: “Nah, I get it. Starting over. Makes sense.”

“Generous.” Rafael swept a hand through his hair, more silvered than Sonny remembered it, or maybe it just appeared that way for how close it was cropped at the sides. “Some might have called it fleeing the scene.”

“Some people can say a lot of stuff,” Sonny said. He hefted Julia off of his shoulders, bringing her to rest her against his side where, miraculously, she seemed to be losing some of the livewire energy.  

The watch around his wrist buzzed with another notification: Bella, asking where he was, reminding him that they’d need to catch the shuttle back. She could wait another minute.

“You live around here now?” Sonny asked.

“Not really. About an hour out.” Rafael shifted his weight, seeming to consider his words carefully. “I’m flying. Back, actually. New York. Visiting my mother for the holidays.”

“Huh. Small world. You’re going there and I’m coming here.”

“Yes, well, I would have asked your plans but your”—he gestured to Sonny’s shirt—“I’ve got the gist.”

His cheeks went hot. “Ha. Yeah. Straight to the point.”

“Disney?” Rafael asked.

“A cruise. Caribbean. Leaves port tomorrow.” Sonny pinched at the name on his shirt to emphasize: “We’re all staying at the airport hotel overnight. Makes things easier.”

“Well, that explains the racket,” Rafael said with hint of a sly grin.

“Oh yeah, we’re a raucous bunch for sure.” He leaned in conspiratorially, tapped Rafael’s shoulder with his knuckles. “Maybe you heard my Aunt Norma complaining about the price of coffee at the New Jersey terminal. If you haven’t, you’d be the last person on earth.”

Rafael laughed, his shoulders easing from his guarded stance.  

Sonny bounced Julia on his side. “And this one here, she spent the first twenty minutes running laps in the room and shrieking like a banshee, so the downstairs neighbors probably love us.”

“I’m sure they do.”

He felt his wrist buzz again; he wouldn’t be able to delay Bella much longer. “So ah, you leavin’ soon? When’s your flight?”

“That’s the question of the hour, really. I guess you just missed the weather by inches.”

“Seriously? What, you’re delayed?” Sonny remembered the forecasted snow — Amanda had been talking about the prospect of taking Jesse sledding — but he thought it was supposed to hit tomorrow.

Rafael bent over to retrieve the basket at his feet. “Canceled. The airline put me up overnight and I’ll try again in the morning.”

“So wait, you’re staying at the airport hotel too?”

“I am. Well, hopefully not below you,” he added in Julia’s direction.

“Hey, she’s a great alarm clock. 5:30 sharp, every day.”

“Anyway. It was good to see you, Sonny.” The way Rafael said his name then, reverent, eyes lingering, Sonny felt a familiar flutter in his chest, a flush at the base of his neck. “I should—”

“Have a drink with me.” Sonny's words tumbled out, and Rafael arched a brow in response. “I mean, y’know, if you want. There’s some bar in the terminal across from the hotel, I just— what are the odds we’re both here, right?”

He bit his lower lip in consideration. “I wouldn’t want to intrude on your family—”

“Hey, no, you’d be doin’ me a favor. Otherwise I’m gonna get tasked with trying to put this one to sleep.” To Julia, he added: “You ready to go to sleep Jules?”

“No!” It was a defiant declaration, albeit a bit muted as she rested her head against Sonny’s chest. It drew a hint of amusement from Rafael, and he glanced at the silver watch on his wrist, seeming to relent. “9:30? I could use a drink I suppose, after the day I’ve had.”

“Great! The bar’s like basically in the lobby. Latitude Change or something? I just gotta give this one back to her ma first and then I’ll be there.”

As though he’d summoned her with the mention, Sonny heard Bella behind him at the far end of the aisle shouting his name. “What are you doin’ down there Sonny?” Then, to Tommy: “I told you he didn’t get my messages. Look at him.”

Sonny turned to face her and waved, stepping aside to reveal Rafael beside him. “Over here! Look who it is!” In the months that had followed Tommy’s trial, Sonny had talked at great length with Bella about Rafael, their shared admiration of his courtroom prowess and how if Sonny were a lawyer, that’s the kind of lawyer he’d have wanted to be.

Rafael gave Sonny a small shake of the head, barely perceptible, and whispered ‘No.’ Then, as Bella and Tommy's approach seemed inevitable, he appeared to gear himself up, puffing out his chest and raising his chin.

“Mr. Barba?” Bella asked, looking between Sonny and Rafael. “Oh my god, Sonny, that’s so crazy! Tommy, look who it is!”

“Oh, wow, hey there Mr. Barba. It’s good to see you,” Tommy said, shifting the grocery bags onto one arm so that he could extend the other hand for an earnest shake.

Rafael took his hand firmly and gave a tired looking smile to the both of them. “It’s good to see you,” he said. “Sonny was just catching me up to speed on the family trip.”

“Sonny,” Bella repeated slowly, emphasizing each syllable and shooting him a sly smile. “Did you know he was gonna be here?” She motioned for Sonny to hand over Julia, who’d begun to show signs of imminent dozing.

“What? No,” Sonny said, taken aback. Like he could plan something like this. “How could I know that?” But Rafael seemed to pick up on the strange chord that had been struck, and glanced warily between the siblings.

“You really gotta come back to New York, Mr. Barba,” Bella said, tapping his shoulder affably — a Carisi family signature — as she shifted her daughter against her hip. “I’m tired of hearin’ rundowns about how the new you is not so good at his job.”

“Bella,” Sonny said, his tone a clear warning. She grinned, and he shook his head sharply. He didn't realize that Bella picked up on how much he’d talked about Rafael, or Peter Stone in comparison, but the way she wagged her brow at him made him want to shoo her along before her mouth got away from her.

“What? It’s true. Anyway Sonny, we really gotta take advantage of this moment before Jules finds her second wind. Besides, Tommy’s tired of holdin’ all the groceries, and the shuttle’s gonna be here any minute.” She lit up then, as though she’d had a brilliant thought. “You know what? Here, we’ll just let you guys catch up. You can get an Uber, right?” Then to Rafael: “It was so nice to see you, Mr. Barba. Think about coming back, okay?”

And then, for the second time that evening, Bella had turned on her heel before Sonny could so much as comment on the plan presented to him. Not far enough down the aisle to be subtle, Bella stage-whispered _Tommy_ in a tone that conveyed volumes of subtext, those entire conversations that married couples can have in single words, and Sonny felt his cheeks burn. He hadn’t been sure that anything could top the embarrassment of the salmon-colored cruise shirt he wore, but trust Bella, little sister that she was, to be good for a special brand of humiliation.

He cleared his throat. “Jeez. Family, am I right?”

“Occasionally,” Rafael said with a sly smile. “Rare occasions.”

“You’re kinda insufferable,” Sonny said as they left the aisle for the self-checkout lane. “I forgot that about you.”

“Ten months gone and you’ve forgotten my finest quality. Ouch.”

 _Hardly_ , Sonny thought. He couldn’t say that though, not now.

He’d often tried to put it into words, the enormity of his feelings. He’d tried amidst long hours in Rafael’s office making sense of twisting cases, those evenings when it all spilled over into shared drinks at Forlini’s and feigned arguments about who was picking up the tab. He’d tried so many times.

But all of Sonny’s attempts never amounted to anything more than expressions of ardent admiration for the guy, and Rafael proved exceptionally skilled at deflecting admiration lobbed his way, at least if Sonny was the one pitching it.

“Yeah, okay _Rafael_ , somehow in ten months you thought I fathered a toddler, so.”

“Now wa—”

“Nah, I saw your face. You were doin’ the math.”

Predictably, Rafael didn’t admit defeat, just took it in stride as he slid his credit card through the payment machine. “I guess I just always assumed you and Rollins would figure things out.”

“Rollins?” Sonny gave a bitter chuckle as he rounded Rafael in the lane to bag up the small box of eyedrops. “Nah, she’s off living the dream with her cardiologist.”

“She’s… what?”

“Shit, yeah, I guess you missed all that. Actually, she’s got a kid on the way.”

“Really? Wow.” Rafael squinted, trying to make sense of the news. “And, she’s... in need of a cardiologist?”

“No no, that’s the father. Doctor Al.” He couldn’t help the bite as he said the name. Rollins was one of the brightest women he knew, one of the most dedicated SVU detectives and a loyal friend besides. He just couldn’t understand how she entertained such a soft spot for a certain brand of douchebag. “Her and Jesse moved in with the guy. Makes sense, I guess.”

“I take it you’re not a fan?”

“Honestly? Guy’s a piece of shit. But who am I to tell her how to live her life? She’s got a roof over her head and a guy who makes her happy, I guess. Jesse’s taken care of. The rest is details.” He shrugged and handed Rafael his bag.

Outside the store, Rafael went about calling an Uber on his phone while Sonny took the opportunity to text Bella: “i'm catching a ride back to the hotel now in case you worried about abandoning me at a strange grocery store in the middle of the night.” Then he tacked on: “abandoning me 1200 miles away from home.”

Satisfied with the guilt he'd laid on her, Sonny pocketed his phone and watched the steady stream of headlights on the distant overpass. “I can’t believe this heat,” he said to fill the silence. “I probably should’ve packed more shorts.”

“For a Caribbean cruise? Who would have thought.”

“Look, I’m just saying there’s something fundamentally wrong with wearing shorts in December.”

“Welcome to the South.”

“Well, anyway, you look good,” Sonny said. Then, reflexively, he amended: “Like the weather’s treating you well. The change of pace and all. Relaxed.”

Rafael rubbed at his jaw. “The relative anonymity has been nice. Family has been… family. You can relate, I’m sure.”

Sonny chuckled. “Twenty-six Carisis under one roof.”

“God help us all.”

“Hey, now that I’m thinking of it,” Sonny said, “I always thought you used to come down here for Christmas with your ma. For the holidays.” Sonny had once tried to invite some coworkers to see the Christmas tree lighting in his parents’ neighborhood, extending the invite to Rafael to see if he’d even entertain the notion, but Rafael cited the annual travel plans.

A shadow passed over Rafael’s face at the mention of it. “Observant.”

“So then what, ten months down here and you miss the polar vortex enough to wanna go up there instead?”

“Something like that,” he said, then glanced at his phone again. “I think I just saw our driver turn into the lot. Look alive.”

Bella's reply didn't come until they were seated in the back of the silver Camry. “ur a big boy. a cop even! i trust you,” she'd written. Then: “don't stay out too late ;)”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so it's March now apparently? Whoops. And so the Christmas(ish) story continues. Anyway, thanks everyone who stopped by <3 I hope you (continue to) enjoy the ride!

The bamboo fencing around the perimeter of the small bar adjacent to the hotel lobby was Sonny’s first clue that this wasn’t going to be your average anonymous airport joint. Tiki torches with flickering LED lamps dotted the grassy periphery, and a ruddy Santa statue posed outside in board shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, beckoning them in. Whereas Sonny had judged the name of the bar in passing to be some hip airline reference painted in looping script on the wall outside: _Changes in Latitude, Changes in Attitude_ , he learned from the menu placard propped outside that it was instead a reference to some Jimmy Buffett song he’d never heard. And that wasn't even the name of the place, he came to find out; the driftwood sign hung in the doorway read: **The Wild Meridian, Est. 1979**.

Breezy steel drum underscored the hum of casual conversation, a song that became recognizable as some island version of Carol of the Bells. An abundance of beachy parrothead memorabilia hung from all available real estate, string lights and palm trees and pithy signage: _Life’s a Beach, Enjoy the Waves_. Patrons, flanked by their rolling suitcases and mismatched luggage, occupied most of the scattered tall tables in the room, sipping on their signature drinks and consulting tall menus.

Sonny spotted a few empty seats towards the back of the bar and ushered Rafael toward them. A television was perched over their stake of bartop, and in his approach Sonny realized the screen was on some poor junior reporter making a brave face as she buffeted herself against sheets of Manhattan snow.

“That doesn't look too good,” Sonny said as he took his seat, making room for Rafael beside him and gesturing toward the television.

“It doesn't,” Rafael said, furrowing his brow. He retrieved his phone from his pocket and thumbed through it, probably checking on his flight status. Sonny watched the snow swirl around the streetlamps, wondering if Rafael would get to fly into the city by the actual holiday, three days out, and if not, what he'd be doing instead.

The bartender, a young woman wearing a pastel t-shirt and her hair pulled slick in a high bun, came to take their order. Sonny began: “I’ll have a, uh”—he squinted, appraising the nearby taps—”a Landshark and...”

“Bahama Mama,” Rafael added without looking up from his phone.

“Right away,” the bartender said, giving them a bright smile as she set two branded blue coasters on the bartop, each with white anchors sketched above their nautical advice: _Seas the Day!_

“A _what_?” Sonny asked when she was out of earshot.

“Hm?” Rafael looked up from his phone curiously, then catching Sonny's drift he gave a wry, lopsided sort of smile as he waved a hand. “When in Margaritaville…yes?”

Sonny laughed and shook his head. He would have sooner guessed Rafael would ask them to relocate bars than to order something so prominently featured on a Happy Hour menu, posed in its advertisements as though someone had abandoned it, glittering with condensation, on the white sands of a pristine beach.

When the bartender returned with their drinks, Rafael’s was presented much like its picture, in a curving glass garnished with fruit on a skewer and a small patterned umbrella, entirely ostentatious beside Sonny’s simple pint glass. Unaffected by Sonny’s feigned disbelief, Rafael plucked the cherry from the rim of the glass and popped it in his mouth with aplomb. “I’m beginning to question whether I'm flying out tomorrow,” he said, neatly removing the umbrella from the drink and pointing it at the television where a weatherman now swiped his arm across a large swath of “wintry mix” on the eastern seaboard.

Sonny had no interest in the weather, however. He was lost in thought, admiring Rafael beside him. Over the past few months, Sonny had become resigned to the fact that he’d probably never see Rafael again, gradually losing the idle curiosity he’d maintained when popping into nearby coffee shops and cafes in the hopes of catching a glimpse.

Nightcaps at Forlini’s had proved to be a harder habit to break. He kept the same set of bar stools warm despite the fact that their beer selection sucked for the prices, and even though Peter Stone showed up more times than he would have liked just to shoot the shit. In fact, Stone might have gotten the impression that they now hung out together regularly; that they decompressed and shared war stories and threw back beers like bros, and hell, maybe it had become true enough in the time that had passed.

But somewhere buried deep was that eternal hope that Rafael would have darkened the doorstep again one night, and that Sonny’s dedication to their bar stools would be read as something he had never been able to articulate. That was the last relic he’d held onto, sticky vinyl made sacred.

Rafael caught his gaze then, seeming confused by the attention, and Sonny stammered into a segue. “So ah— what have you been up to? Here? In Florida? I mean, my only points of reference for retiring to Florida are the Golden Girls. And one of my dad’s aunts who lived near Disney. She hated those ah, big bugs, what are they?"

“Palmettos,” Rafael supplied. “They’re not so bad when you’ve had a lifetime of city roaches. But retirement, well, it’s not nearly as geriatric as you keep implying. I’m living in a nice apartment in a building my uncle manages. Good morning light. Ground floor, which is a change of pace.” He took a sip of his drink, then added: “I’m teaching. Legal ethics, if you can imagine.” He snorted, as though he himself did not. “Just a night class. If I like it, if they like me, I’ll take on more. I’m also working on a textbook chapter for a former colleague, his revised edition. So—”

Sonny cut in: “So not much actual retirement in your retirement.”

“What, you thought I’d been reduced to early bird specials? In bed by 7? How old do you think I am?”

Sonny laughed, waving a hand. “No, that’s not what I meant. I just thought you might have, I dunno, taken it easier down here. Considering.”

“Huh. How much relaxing have you done on vacation so far?”

“Nah, we’ve only been on vacation for like 12 hours. I don’t think the hotel the night before counts as vacation.”

Rafael challenged him with the flick of his brow.

“Well okay, I haven’t had much _time_ to relax. Between figuring out whose rooms are on what floor, whose luggage might still be in Jersey, who forgot their “stress pills” back in Brooklyn, and that’s not to mention who is still very concerned with the six dollar coffee that they would never have bought in Jersey if they knew it was six dollars…”

Rafael chuckled. “Right.”

“I mean, I don’t know what you expect me to do when there’s 26 of us—”

“Jesus,” Rafael said. “You were serious about that?”

“Yeah. 26. It’s been a lot to manage.” After a beat of silence, Sonny added: “Y’know, originally my parents, it was going to be just an anniversary thing for them. Their 45th. Just the two of them.”

“45 years. Impressive.” He lifted his glass and clinked the rim against Sonny’s on the bar. “And how did that turn into 26 family members on a boat?”

Sonny took a gulp of his drink, a toast, then cleared his throat. “Well, word got out that they were cruisin’ for their 45th anniversary. I mean, taking a cruise, you know. But then Teresa’s 45th birthday was also gonna be comin’ right up next year—”

“Catholics.”

He gave a sly smile. “Catholics. So then it was for the anniversary and the birthday, so that meant all the sisters, all the nieces and nephews. And me. Then, somewhere down the line, when the third aunt’s family invited themselves to celebrate too, it…evolved...into this. Family Christmas. And the birthday and the anniversary. Probably somebody's cat's birthday too if you ask the right cousin. Wait, what was I proving with this?”

Rafael wore an expression that Sonny recognized from so many cross examinations, the pride inherent in a well-laid trap. “That you're in no place to judge necessary degrees of taking it easy.”

“Ha. Fine.”

He drew a long finger around the rim of his drink. “And now, because I’m curious, when was your last vacation? Better yet, your last vacation sans family?”

Sonny chewed on the question a moment, a guilty smile blossoming despite his best efforts. He honestly couldn't remember, not for either question, and he’d be damned if he admitted that out loud. There was a time he halfway considered going with some college friends on some European spring break trip, but he never could justify the investment to himself. God, when _was_ the last time he’d had a vacation?

“Mhm.” Rafael’s satisfaction with the silence bordered on smug. “I thought so.”

“Alright, alright. Whatever. You got me. But hey, I’m relaxing now, right? Besides, I did beg off of some serious heavy lifting on account of my back, which is a first really. Jeez, you’d think some of my Aunts were packing for the end of the world.”

“What’s the matter with your back?”

“Ah, yeah, actually I just finished some mandatory PT. Get this”—he leaned in—“we’re searching this big old house, these old shut-ins, brothers, it was a wild case. And the house, it’s just packed to the brim with... stuff. Just stuff everywhere. Total hoarders. Anyway, you always prepare for the worst when searching potential crime scenes, right? Who prepares for the boobytrapped bookshelf? Yeah. I was laid out for 40 minutes until they could get backup to get the damn thing off me.”

Rafael drew a sharp breath through his teeth in commiseration.

“No good books to show for it either. Ah, well, PT helped though. That was… definitely a tough one. The whole case.” Sonny trailed off into thought. He took a hard swig of his drink to wash away the memory; one of those cases where justice, _real_ justice, was an impossibility from the start.

“I miss it,” Rafael said suddenly, his voice gruff. “Sometimes. The… frenetic... energy of it all. I don’t know.” He picked at the coaster where his drink sat, and Sonny waited a moment for him to expound, but the silence just swallowed them up.

“Well, anyway, you’re missed too," Sonny said, earnest, hoping to dispel the strange sense of sadness that had settled. "Fin’s been giving me shit for a week ‘cause I told him I was gonna call you about some warrants the other day. Force of habit.” It hadn’t been the first time he'd made that particular slip, not close to it, but he wouldn’t mention that part. Rollins had stopped bothering to correct him when he’d mention sending something to Barba, opting instead for rolled eyes or the occasional _yeah, see how that works out for you_.

Rafael flicked his gaze back to Sonny, his interest piqued. “Hm. I’d have said you were in capable hands these days, but it sounds like you’ve told your sister differently.”

“Ah, jeez, Bella." He thought back to his sister in the supermarket, wagging her brow like some sort of comedian. "She was exaggerating. She’s always like that.” He looked down, bashful, then made acutely aware of the fact that he was still in his godforsaken cruise shirt. "God. I really should have changed."

"It suits you," Rafael said, a hint of humor cracking through his pensive mood. “And it fits the… ambiance.” He waved a hand toward a neon clock that hung behind the bar, beneath it the reliable adage of harried travelers: _It's 5 o’Clock Somewhere!_

"Yeah, right. Besides, Gina said it's wrong for my... undertones." He air-quoted undertones, a word Gina had said no less than three times in his proximity, and yet never directly to him.

"She's right,” Rafael replied matter-of-factly, as though it were a concept obvious to everyone, not unlike Gina in his delivery. Before Sonny could object, he continued: “But it's a nice gesture. Sentimental. Nice to... be among family."

“Thanks,” Sonny replied. “I think.” Hoping for more levity, and particularly a brand levity not at his own expense, he added: “So what are you guys gonna do for the holidays?”

“Hm?”

“You said you were going to see your mom, right? You guys have any big traditions?”

A trace of something dark passed over Rafael’s face before he settled his gaze on the television, where reporters had moved on to something besides weather. “The usual fare. Gifts. Guilt. Overindulgence. More guilt.”

“I hear ya,” Sonny said. He knew something was bothering Rafael, it was the second time he’d deflected questions about the holiday since they’d stumbled upon each other, but Sonny knew even better that straightforward questions would bear no answers from the guy. “Believe it or not, this’ll be my first Christmas where we’re not all at my parents’ house.”

“Oh, that I believe.” Rafael drained the final dregs of his drink, then slid the empty glass away and dropped the discarded umbrella inside. He fiddled with his phone. “So, it appears the airline has now scheduled me on a 7 AM flight. That seems…unrealistic, considering.”

“I bet it’ll be fine. The storm wasn’t supposed to last all night. 7AM? That’ll put you there at least a few hours before the snow all turns to grey sludge.”

“You always were idealistic to a fault,” Rafael said, then tucked the phone into his pocket and set his jaw, appearing resigned to some unknowable fate. “I should probably— I ought to try to get some sleep if I have to play the airline’s game again at an ungodly hour.”

“You don’t want another one?” Sonny asked. “You sure?”

In that moment, staring at the once punny _Seas the Day!_ on his coaster now half distorted by condensation, Sonny became all too aware of how little time they’d been gifted, and how much of it they’d squandered to idle chatter, to small talk about the weather and who was worse at relaxing. This was it — they’d pay for their drinks and then what? Goodbyes and good-lucks? Well-intentioned promises about keeping in touch?

“Believe it or not,” Rafael echoed, “one Bahama Mama is good enough for me.” He fished his wallet from his back pocket, and Sonny grabbed his wrist to stop him.

“Wait, hey, lemme get it okay?” Rafael stiffened at the contact, shook his head, but Sonny insisted. “Seriously, I invited you out. And I mean, hey, when am I gonna get the chance again, right?” Sonny flagged their bartender over and asked her for the check.

Once she had retreated to the service station, safely out of earshot, Rafael asked, “What do you mean, get the chance?”

“Well, like, I dunno.” Sonny swept a hand through his hair, imminent goodbyes a mounting pressure in his chest. “I would’ve liked to buy you a drink before you left, y’know? You just kinda… disappeared. I didn’t—”

“I...,” Rafael began, then licked his lips and looked toward his own lap. “Sure. I’m sorry.”

“No, I get it." Sonny had wanted it to be a nice gesture, not one that was tinged with remorse. "I just— let me get these, okay?”

“Let the record show however that retirement hasn’t left me destitute,” Rafael said briskly as he put his wallet away. Then, as though he reconsidered the defensive tone, he added: “But thank you, Sonny.”

"You're welcome. Really." Sonny placed his card on top of the curling receipt the bartender had deposited and slid it back across the countertop. “Just... glad I got to.”

Once they’d exited the bar, headed towards the beacon of blue-tinsel Christmas tree glittering in the distant hotel lobby, Rafael turned to Sonny and stopped them in their tracks. “Look. It was good. To see you, I mean.”

Sonny felt the sincerity light something deep in his chest, and he ducked his head against the bright heat of it. “Yeah. It was good to see you too. Huh, crazy, right?”

“What were the odds,” Rafael said, giving a soft snort of disbelief. “Really.”

“Let’s keep in touch,” Sonny said, and while he’d just been lamenting the prospect of such a phrase being leveled between them, he’d be damned if he let it just be some empty promise. “Seriously. Here, gimme your phone.”

Rafael ran his palm across his back pocket, seeming to consider the request before finally handing his phone over to Sonny. It was a sleek vision compared to the squat brick he used to carry, and Sonny couldn't help his disbelief: “No shit. You got rid of the Blackberry?”

“Fresh start.” Rafael gave a small shrug. “New area code, too.”

Sonny dialed his own number from Rafael’s phone and waited for his phone to buzz in his pocket. “There, see, you got my phone number now, and I’ve got yours.”

“Good,” Rafael said, marveling at his screen for a moment before pocketing it. As they crossed the threshold of the hotel, he added: “And remember, the night nurse has me in bed by 7, so.”

He looked so proud of himself then, his joke, and Sonny felt a flutter in his chest at the sight of that expression. God, he’d missed this.

“Yeah yeah, okay. You’re never gonna forgive me caring enough to ask you how you’re doing down here, huh?”

Rafael chuckled as they fell back into an easy pace, familiar. “I’m just warding off the possibility of those misplaced late night calls you were talking about. Strong-arming warrants or... arguing for obscure precedents. Those were the worst, you know that right?”

“Ha! Sure. Nah, I wouldn’t want to interrupt your _stories_ or anything with my exciting detective work.”

“Well you’ve got a new prosecutor to bother with all of that.”

As they approached the elevator in the hallway, Sonny took a few steps ahead to press the “up” button. He turned back to face Rafael, who was considering the door to the stairwell in the distance, as though he might break away. “Yeah, he’s not so fun to bother, though.” Sonny leaned out and tapped Rafael’s shoulder to regain his attention, then reclined his back against the frame of the elevator.

“What a compliment,” Rafael replied, considering Sonny posed before him, his expression now appreciative, and Sonny could feel a flush rising from the base of his neck. He wanted to say something smooth, began to slick a hand through his hair, but the elevator dinged behind him and the scrape of the metal door in his periphery startled him forward into a stumble, breaking any pretense of that poised confidence.

Sonny recovered quick, maneuvering to hold the elevator door for Rafael, and he was struck with the memory of doing it so often at the precinct, so instinctively as they discussed or debated the merits of whatever case they were working on. Rafael clicked the 5th floor button, a dishearteningly quick ride, then settled in against the back wall. Sonny pressed his own button, 11th floor, and idled at the panel as the doors shut. He wanted to extend the moment, but how? An invitation to his room felt too forward, and yet, what else did he have to offer?

He pretended to read the small bulletin advertising the continental breakfast hours, the hotel’s important phone numbers, and brief instructions on how to check out. Sonny was hoping that Rafael would break the silence, but when he finally did, it was not what Sonny had hoped he would say.

“What’s going on?”

Sonny looked up, realizing that while he’d been weighing the few options available to him, the elevator had stopped its upward motion despite the fact that its doors remained shut. Probably other guests waiting Sonny thought, maybe a misfiring of buttons pressed, but then a loud hiss and thunk startled them as the car seemed to settle in place. According to the illuminated sign, an old-fashioned gauge, they were somewhere between the fourth and fifth floors.

“Beats me,” Sonny said, furrowing his brow. He tried pressing the 5 again, and nothing happened. “Huh.”

“Are we stuck?” Rafael’s voice climbed an octave as he spoke. “Wait, we’re stuck?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, your feedback is so dearly appreciated, and if you want to befriend me elsewhere/see me wax poetic about the good ol' days of SVU, you can find me on [tumblr](http://oh-little-owl.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/ohlittleowl).
> 
> Note: There is a Margaritaville in the Miami airport apparently (and google now thinks I'm planning an extensive Florida vacation haha). The Wild Meridian is just my deeper cut version of a Buffet theme bar :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uh, let's pretend it's not been like almost 3 months since I last updated what was originally intended as a Christmas-ish story.

“Hey, no big deal.” Sonny located the call button quickly and pressed it. “Nothing to worry about. I’m sure they’ll get it moving. Might just be processing something, like kids pressin’ too many buttons. I totally did that as a kid when we stayed in Atlantic City for my dad’s cousin’s wedding. A bunch of us kids were stuck in there for like thirty minutes listening to the same crappy elevator version of Living La Vida Loca—”

“That’s fascinating. Try opening the door,” Rafael offered, his voice still high and clipped. “Press the button.”

Sonny pressed the “door open” button obediently, then when nothing happened, the call button again.

“Nah, s’not working. Someone should hear this call button, though.”

He heard Rafael begin to pace their tight enclosure. “I should— I’ll call 911,” he offered, so quick that it became a single slurred word, and it sounded like he took a gulp of air after he spoke.

“Woah, hold on there, we might not need the firemen just yet.” Sonny pressed the call button a third time, holding it a few seconds for good measure, then glanced over his shoulder to assess Rafael’s apparently deteriorating state. Panic colored Rafael’s every movement, from his ragged breathing to the sharp angles his taut muscles made as he paced between the walls.

“Woah, Raf, you gotta stop pacing. Hey.” Sonny abandoned the wall of buttons and approached him, catching him by the shoulders mid-pace and blocking his frenzied trail. “You’re okay.”

“I’m—” Rafael shook his head, looking anywhere but meeting Sonny’s gaze. “I— claustrophobic. I’m— it’s—”

“You’re okay, let’s sit down, alright? I’m gonna call the front desk and we'll get outta here in no time, but let’s sit you down, okay?”

Sonny pressed Rafael back against the elevator wall, and he slid to the ground, settling with his legs spread out in front of him. He seemed comically young in that moment despite the silver and scruff; so delicate and small, all his usual bravado lost in the undertow of panic. Sonny sat down beside him, pressing his own palms into the scratchy industrial carpet. It wasn't the biggest elevator someone could get stuck in, but the tight enclosure wasn't enough to trigger any of his own anxieties.

The constant hum of anxiety that once consumed his waking hours seemed to be a more abstract concept now that he’d been seeing a therapist regularly. She'd diagnosed him with PTSD, started him on some medications that helped. The diagnosis had been a long time coming, something to attribute all the insomnia and night sweats to, all the bouts of phantom illness and fatigue, the bottomless well of anger he was so quick to draw comfort from. He’d only been going for a few months, but things were starting to feel better. He was grateful to be able to plumb the depths of her advice in order to navigate the next few moments.

“Hey, Rafael, breathe out, okay? Let out a big sigh, right? Like, hey, imagine I just said something completely inexcusable.” He nudged Rafael’s shoulder and leaned into the comedy inherent in his own thick accent: “I got an obscure Pennsylvania case from… 1974… that sets a clear precedent for your case. Am I right, counselor?”

That broke through. Rafael let out his tightly held breath in a shaky chuckle.

“Yeah, exactly. Now don’t breathe in, just wait a few seconds with your mouth closed. Relax your chest.”

Sonny’s phone had limited service now — of course it did — but he now knew where the hotel emergency numbers were listed on a card beneath the floor buttons, so he plugged the front desk number into his phone and hoped it would go through.

“Now you gotta breathe in through your nose, real slow. Like count it. Four seconds. Hold it when you get to 4.”

The phone took forever to ring, long enough for Sonny to worry that his service would limit him from placing outgoing calls all together. Finally, it began to ring, and the receptionist eventually picked up.

“Hey, yeah, there’s a couple of us stuck in your elevator, the one near the ice machines. I think we’re between the fourth and fifth floors. I pressed the call button a couple times but no one picked up. It’s not moving.”

He put his hand over the phone and spoke to Rafael who had his eyes pressed firmly shut. “Now you  double it. Eight seconds. Four in, eight out. Keep doin’ that.” He put the phone back up to his ear, and placed a hand on Rafael’s knee, hoping that he was helping in some way. Sonny didn’t know what he’d do if the guy went into a full blown panic. It was after dark, and who knew what the maintenance situation would be like at this place or how long they could be trapped.

“Sorry to hear that, sir,” the receptionist was saying. “Are you okay? Are you safe?”

“Yeah, we’re safe. It’s just stuck, doors closed and all.” Sonny watched as Rafael struggled through a few deep breaths. “Just a bit shaken up.”

“We’ll send someone to get y’all out right away. I’m calling night maintenance now, okay?”

“That’s great. Thank you.”

Papers rustled in the background. “Alright, someone should be there to help shortly. Call the front desk if anything changes, okay? And please, call 911 first if anything dangerous happens.”

“Thank you. I will.”

He hung up, then turned to Rafael, who was looking slightly less electrified as he focused on his breathing. Sonny realized his palm was still resting on Rafael’s knee, and he removed it quickly. “They’re uh — they’re getting maintenance on it. I bet we’ll be out pretty quick, we’re only in between floors. Can’t be too hard to fix. Probably just gotta turn it off and on again, right?”

Rafael smiled weakly, his eyes still shut and his breathing less labored.

“Just keep doing that breathing thing.” Sonny leaned his head back against the elevator wall and stared into the textured ceiling. Worst case scenario, there was an escape hatch, but he prayed that wouldn’t be necessary.

“You studying psychiatry now too, Carisi?” Rafael opened his eyes and cast a glance around their quarters. “A true renaissance man.”

“Ha. No. I ah— not studying it as much as... benefiting from it.”

“Oh,” Rafael said. After a moment, he added a quiet: “Sorry.”

“Nah, it’s... it comes with the territory.”

Rafael pressed a few buttons on his phone. “No service.” He let his head fall back against the wall with an audible thump. “Just perfect.”

“Yeah. It probably won’t be long, though. Til they get us, y’know?”

Rafael chuckled softly to himself. “Think they could just keep me here ‘til the new year?”

Sonny furrowed his brow. “I thought you were...” He stopped short of reminding Rafael of the source of his panic so soon after the worst of it appeared to be quelled. “Flying out? You gotta get to New York, yeah?”

Rafael dropped the phone beside himself, deflated. “Eh. My mother didn’t really want to do Christmas anyway.”

“Yeah, right. I can't believe that. See, my ma is pissed there’s no real Mass on our boat. Unitarian doesn’t count. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has a midnight Mass queued up on her iPad that she's planning on guilting us into watching.”

“You think I’m being facetious. No, my mother actually declined. Declined to come down here. Declined to have Christmas with the family.”

Sonny winced at the sadness that hung on Rafael’s clipped words. “‘Cause of—?” Once again, he caught himself in the midst of a sentence he regretted starting. _You_. _That_. He couldn’t say it, couldn’t name the implication.

“Mostly.” Rafael’s lips drew a grim line. “You can imagine she didn’t agree with my…” he trailed off, then cleared his throat. “My decisions.”

“That’s tough. I’m sorry.”

“And besides, it makes for unpleasant family dinner conversation.” He mimed the scene as he spoke: “How’s the job hunt, _mijo_? I just don’t know how I could live with myself in your shoes. Pass me the _lechón_.”

“She came to your trial,” Sonny ventured. “Every day. I mean that’s worth somethin’, right?”

“Sure she did. She wanted me locked up.”

“Nah. No way. You’re her son.”

“Yes,” Rafael replied, his voice gone cold. “Exactly.”

They sat in a tense silence for a few moments after the declaration, Sonny picking at a thread on the knee of his jeans, Rafael staring daggers at the ceiling.

Sonny cleared his throat. “Well I gotta ask — if your mom wasn’t going to celebrate Christmas with you, then why are you flying to New York?” For a moment, he wondered if Rafael had been in contact with Liv after all. Hosting him for Christmas, this particularly difficult Christmas, it seemed like a Liv thing to do.

“To _impose_ Christmas upon her,” Rafael said, punctuating the sentiment with a snort of disbelief. “God, what a concept. But, realistically, how many more holidays can I assume we’ll get? Besides, we’re a stubborn breed. Part of me thinks she wants it this way. Just the two of us, like it used to be before we could really afford the airfare to see everyone down here. Just her and her prodigal son.”

Sonny ached for Rafael then, for his hollow voice, the weight of the admission and the loneliness that always seemed to be tailing him; how there was exponentially more of it now in the aftermath of everything.

“How did you know about her though?” Rafael asked.

“Huh?”

His eyes had narrowed as though he were assessing something on the ceiling. “My mother. That she was at the trial? Did Liv tell you?”

Sonny huffed, a guilty sound, and looked back to their reflection in the brushed metal door.

“You weren’t…?”

“In the hallways,” Sonny said, brusque, pulling off the proverbial band-aid. “Most days. Whenever I could be. Traded some shifts here and there.”

He glanced back to see how the admission landed, but Rafael was still staring intently at the same spot, his expression firm.

“I couldn’t watch the trial,” Sonny continued around the lump welling in his throat. “You up there and all. Kinda cowardly, yeah. But, I couldn’t… not be there, you know? Like, I don’t think you get how much you…” Sonny trailed off, voice faltering. He shook his head, determined to get through the sentence, the sentiment. “I wouldn’t be the guy I am today if I hadn’t met you.”

Rafael cast a glance in his direction then, his eyes sharp as they ever were in the interrogation rooms they had shared. “Don’t give me so much credit.”

“It’s true,” Sonny said, insistent. “And I would have come to the trial if you asked. I wanted to. I thought since you didn’t, since you only asked Liv—”

“I didn’t ask Liv,” he snapped, casting his glance upward again. “I didn’t ask anyone. Do you really think, what, that I would delight in reserving you all front row seats for that? My eventual perp walk?”

“You were acquitted,” Sonny reminded him.

“Well, a more competent prosecutor would have had that jury throwing away the key.” After a beat, he added: “I would have.”

Sonny bit down on the impulse to smile. Rafael wasn’t wrong in his brag; he would have had the jury exactly where he wanted them to be, Sonny had no doubt.

“But they didn’t throw away the key,” Sonny said, insistent. “A jury of your peers found you not guilty.”

“And we both know that means fuck-all sometimes.”

Sonny sighed. There was only so much of this he could take. “Sure. Okay. But for what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re guilty—”

“And so I’d argue a clear bias—”

“Look,” Sonny snapped. “Would I have done it? Would I have encouraged you to do it if you ever asked me what I thought? No.” His tone was razor-sharp, ground down by the weight of all the time spent retracing the arc of those final days and wondering why he never saw any of it coming; worse, why none of it — the motivations, the fears, the logic — was ever shared with him. “I wouldn’t have. But it was a situation with no good answers, and you took the brunt of one of the worst ones so that the parents wouldn’t have to. You did what you felt you had to, given the circumstances.” And though he’d never admit it, Sonny was still convincing himself of this, too.

Entirely deflated, he added: “That's what I would've said, y’know,  if you ever asked.”

Rafael sounded penitent when he spoke again, his voice small and wilted. “That’s certainly… it’s a more... charitable view than most Catholics would take.”

Sonny grimaced. “Maybe so. Okay. But a lotta Catholics haven’t had to dig discarded girls outta their shallow graves, though, and they certainly haven’t cuffed priests who killed some of them. There’s a lot of evil in the world, and I’m reminded of that every single day. I feel like I know the difference between evil and, well, everything else we do to get by. I’ve seen enough of it to know.”

Rafael let his head drift back to lean against the wall again.  

“That jury’s opinion might mean fuck-all to you,” Sonny continued, emboldened by the fact that Rafael no longer seemed to be fighting him at every turn. “But mine doesn’t. It shouldn’t, at least.”

After a beat, Rafael said: “I would have… if things were... yes. Yours matters. That's… it's why I couldn't—”

“You alright in there?” A gruff voice laced with static resonated from the small speaker beside the call button.

Sonny and Rafael glanced at each other, startled, then Sonny scrambled to his feet to answer the call.

“Yeah, yeah, we’re okay. Is it fixed?”

“Power failure. We’re gonna—here, the lights will go off for a few minutes while the power cycles. Sorry about that. You’ll be fine though and this usually fixes it. Hang tight, okay?”

“Great,” Rafael muttered to himself.

“Alright,” Sonny said. “Thanks for the help.” He let go of the call button, and stretched his stiff muscles. “Sounds like a few more minutes at most,” he offered, but Rafael sounded unconvinced.

“Sounds more like we’re going to be stuck in a pitch-dark elevator instead.”

True to the mechanic’s word, the overhead lights flickered and shut off, bathing them in obscurity. One by one the illuminated features of the elevator: the buttons, the gauge, faded away. The depth of the darkness gave Sonny an out of body sensation, as though he couldn’t quite get a hold of where his limbs were in relation to his head. He forced a steady breath, in and out. One, two, three, four.

As he let out a deep exhale, Sonny asked: “You okay, Raf?”

“I’ll be better when I’m out of here.” His voice sounded muffled, as though his head were now buried in his hands. “I used to love the dark like this. I hid out in our front closet a lot as a kid. My mother… she would put me there sometimes, when my father came home in a mood, and I got accustomed to it being, I don’t know, my little place. Being in the dark, alone, some measure of protection, not to mention the reprieve from it all, from... them. Him. The quiet — it used to feel safe. Then one day I read some dark story about being buried alive. I’d never considered the possibility. Once I did, I lost the tolerance for dark enclosed spaces.”

Sonny stumbled to sit back down beside Rafael, careful in an attempt not to blindly sit on him. “Let’s leave the buried alive talks for another moment, okay? Like, that’s not one of my greater fears, but I’m not saying I couldn’t be convinced in the right moment, y’know?”

He could hear Rafael chuckle beside him, and Sonny reached out to try and ground himself, to figure out where he sat in relation. His hand found Rafael’s forearm, elbow bent over his raised knee where he'd curled into himself, and Sonny gave his upper arm a squeeze, the best he could do in their position. Rafael untangled his arm then, his hand finding the inside of Sonny's forearm, awkward at first, then the tips of his fingers trailing thin skin down toward his wrist.

Without too much consideration of the potential consequences, Sonny closed his eyes and maneuvered Rafael’s hand into his own. Surprisingly, Rafael acquiesced easily, interlacing his long fingers between Sonny’s. Just like that, they were anchored in the dark.

“This’ll be a funny story, at least,” Sonny offered nervously, his heart galloping now with a different breed of anxiety.

Rafael hummed in response.

“See, now my childhood fear was always getting sucked up in a tornado.”

“Because of all the tornadoes that regularly strike Staten Island?”

“Hey, there have been a couple,” Sonny said, defensive, thinking back to afternoons spent watching weather patterns unfold on the old television in their family den and the “emergency preparedness” plan he’d presented over a family dinner one evening only to be asked the same question by his father. “I mean, statistically speaking, I think mine’s more likely.”

“How can you accurately quantify mine? There’s no bell-ringing anymore.”

“Good point. Yeah, no, that definitely won’t haunt me forever now,” Sonny said with a small laugh, only half joking as he ran his thumb along the contour of Rafael’s hand, reveling in the newness of the feeling, the current passing between them that kept his heart pounding. “I mean, I dunno, lately my fear’s been walking into an easy headshot. My therapist gets to hear a lot about that.”

“I… thought about that too,” Rafael said, as though the fact, the admission, surprised him. “A lot, actually. You know, after everything with Dodds. After… you and Liv and that maniac in that attic. The guy on the roof. And the worst part is, after I left, burned all the bridges and changed my number and moved across the country, it hit me that I'd doomed myself to never know if, well...” His voice faltered. “If something did happen. To you.”

Sonny took in Rafael’s silvered outline, barely perceptible as his eyes struggled to adjust to the darkness. Rafael was looking in his direction too, it seemed, from what little he could make out, the pale glint of his eyes. A distant whirring became audible, a series of clicks and a couple low whines, and Sonny was reminded of the impermanence of this moment, and all the wasted moments that led to this one. All the things that could have happened; all the things that never did.

He hitched forward instinctively, closing a measure of distance between the two of them before stopping himself, waiting for the confirmation that came as Rafael mirrored the motion, leaning inward himself. Their lips met awkwardly at first, Sonny catching the corner of his mouth then bringing his free hand to Rafael’s cheek to guide them, the lush bristle of his beard a welcome shock against Sonny’s palm.

The kiss was none of the things Sonny had imagined on the nights he’d imagined taking hold of the opportunity; not frantic, impassioned, scotch-soaked under the street lamps outside Forlini’s, heady scent of liquor and aftershave. It was soft, delicate, a welcome respite in the dark and... surprisingly sugary. As Sonny pulled back, running his palm along the contour of Rafael’s cheek again and marveling at the warmth, he realized it was the Bahama Mama he tasted, that skewer of boozy fruit. The image of Rafael triumphantly popping a cherry in his mouth made Sonny chuckle, then ignited something deeper in his belly, a wanting.

The yellow overhead lights whined back into existence then, amidst an orchestra of metal gears grinding, of electronics whirring back to life. They both squinted, dropping their hands to wipe blindly at their eyes. The elevator jolted around them, a mechanical hiccup.

“Shit,” Rafael breathed through his gritted teeth, closing his eyes tight and bracing his palms against the carpeted floor as the elevator dropped an inch, then began a painfully slow descent.

“Nah, we’re fine now,” Sonny said. He placed his palm over Rafael’s hand beside him, willing it to be the truth. “S’just a normal elevator ride now.”

“Mm. That’s what they always say before the plummet.”

“Man, plummeting, buried alive... you gotta start watching cheerier stuff, Raf.”

Rafael’s smile then was pained, small, as though he were trying to swallow it. “I’ll take that under advisement.”

They were greeted at the ground floor by a tired looking twenty-something in a faded jumpsuit with “Jace” embroidered on his chest who had to heft the metal door all-the-way open. Rafael spent the walk down the long hotel hallway swearing he’d never willingly endure another elevator as long as he lived, and Sonny wondered how long someone could really ever entirely avoid the prospect.

They took the stairs together, their ascent quiet save for the squeak of linoleum, the eventual crescendo of labored breathing. Sonny stalled at the 5th floor landing, waiting for Rafael who had fallen half-a-staircase behind in the climb. “This is you,” Sonny said, gesturing to the placard with the number 5 hung above the door. “Right? 5th floor?”

Upon reaching the landing, Rafael took a deep breath as if in preparation to say something, then took a few more deeper, ragged breaths. He leaned back against the wall hard and shook his head with a winded sort of laugh.

“You okay?” Sonny asked, not wanting to sound too concerned as though it might imply something.

“No. Not really,” Rafael answered, wiping his palms against the knees of his pants, smile fading, turning sly as he flicked his brow. “Nightcap?”

\---

The thin hotel comforter itched Sonny’s bare skin where he lay, taking up all the space between Rafael’s legs and draping over his hips, resting his cheek against Rafael’s soft, exposed belly as they watched the runway lights glittering along the tarmac that ran outside the hotel window, their bright intensity waning with the hint of dawn just beyond.

Rafael ran his fingers tenderly through the thin hair at Sonny’s temple, hypnotic, and it all felt like something out of a dream, like the dreams Sonny would have sometimes that would make him try out those cafes near the courthouse just in case he’d inherited his late grandma’s gift of prognostication (or, as his dad preferred to call it, her _flair for the dramatic_ ). Rafael was never there after those dreams, but then again, here he was now and didn’t that count for something?

“I’m going to need to go, soon,” Rafael said suddenly, withdrawing his hand from Sonny’s hair. “The flight. I assume we’re actually leaving the ground this time.”

“I figured,” Sonny said, hefting himself up to face Rafael where he lay back, propped against a pillow and his angled elbow. “Yeah, and Bella’s never gonna let me live it down if I don’t change before the family descends on continental breakfast.”

Rafael smiled, glancing over toward a far corner where Sonny imagined his salmon shirt must be discarded.

“So how long are you stayin’ in town?” Sonny asked. “New York, I mean?”

“You’re assuming my mother will have me,” Rafael said.

“She will,” Sonny replied simply, then laid himself back to rest against Rafael’s broad chest. “It’s Christmas. Besides, if she won’t, Liv always will. No question.”

“Yes, she’ll take in any old stray, won’t she,” Rafael replied, picking at some imperfection on the comforter.

“Hey,” Sonny said, catching the barest hint of their reflection in the window, a poignant scene. “You said old this time, not me.”

Rafael chuckled, the vibrations of it warm against Sonny’s cheek. “Well, when will you be back on land?”

“We’ll get back here on the 30th, fly out that evening. Liv’s havin’ a New Years thing. You should come.”

“Unfortunately I’ll be back here enjoying the sunshine by then.”

“Oh.”

They lay in silence for a moment, Sonny letting the muffled sounds of airport traffic drown out his thoughts.

“You could always, I don’t know”—Rafael tangled his fingers into Sonny’s hair again—“extend your stay.”

“Hm?”

“Here. After. If you can spare the time. Come see the new place. Well, not so new anymore, but you know what I mean.”

Sonny turned to rest his chin against Rafael’s chest. “Yeah?” He closed his eyes to luxuriate in the moment, the invitation, the warmth of his skin, the improbability of it all.

“Sure. You can even wear the shirt.”

Sonny laughed. “Sure. It’ll go great with my _sunburned undertones_.”

Rafael trailed his free hand down, palming the curve of Sonny’s shoulder. “I’d like to see that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks as always for your (continued) support. You can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/ohlittleowl) and [tumblr](http://oh-little-owl.tumblr.com/), where I'm lately only talkin' about Schitt's Creek because, well, it's been refreshing to watch a show that actually seems to want to provide a positive experience for its viewer.
> 
> A side note: Jace the mechanic was shoehorned in as a dedication to the actual tow truck driver J.C. that once popped a lock for us downtown on a chilly Christmas Eve night, like something straight out of a Hallmark movie. He probably did not want this dedication, but how else am I gonna marvel at the miracle of it?


End file.
